The Twisted Metal franchise has had a rather convoluted history, filled with ups and downs and jumps between development teams. Singletrac (who you may remembers as the minds behind Jet Moto and the original Warhawk) made the first two classic games, and was then pushed aside for a Sony in-house development team that essentially butchered the title
(while Singletrac went on to make their own car combat series in their off-time, Rogue Trip). The series was then handed to Incog Entertainment, who came out with Twisted Metal Black, which reclaimed Twisted Metal’s glory and gave the franchise the credit it deserved. I have plenty of fond memories of playing the Twisted Metal series. I also have cold, ugly bitter memories, as well. Although the franchise returned to the limelight on the PS2 with Twisted Metal Black, the shameless sequels and spin-offs like Small Brawl still linger in my head. Now on store shelves is Twisted Metal: Head On, a portable version of Sony’s car combat series from the makers of Twisted Metal Black and also one of the few PSP games with Infrastructure online gameplay. For many people, this is all you’d need to know and you’d be halfway to your local Gamestop already. I don’t blame you, but hear me out first.
If you’ve played a Twisted Metal title or really any car combat title, you know the drill: annihilate your opponents. There is, naturally, more to it than just that. You’ve got weapons and power-ups scattered about your various levels, special moves like a freeze weapon, turbo boosts, and interactive environments that will work either for you or against you. The gameplay hasn’t changed much, but that isn’t really a bad thing. Head On shares more with the classic Twisted Metal 2 than Twisted Metal Black, which is a shame because Black’s dark style was great. However, the slightly twisted humor and style from TM2 works better on a handheld that Black probably would so I can’t complain all that much.
Many classic characters and locations make their return in Head On, and plenty will be welcomed with open arms. Axel and Sweet Tooth are there, as is the decidedly popular Paris level, completely with a blow-upable Eiffel Tower. Twisted Metal fans will love these, while I personally can’t help but wish Rogue Trip was still around, as I found the characters, cars, weapons, gameplay elements, and...well, I pretty much liked everything about Rogue Trip more than the Twisted Metal series. Moving on!
You have a few options when choosing a way to play Head On single player. You’ve got a self-explanatory story mode, a challenge mode, and an endurance mode, all of which play essentially the same. The story mode can be plowed through in about half an hour, but that was usually the case with games of the genre. Challenge mode and Endurance mode last about as long as enjoying the game does. While a free-for-all by yourself can be all fun and good, the online gameplay is the real draw of Head On. You’ve got plenty of options whilst setting up an online match and can change a variety of settings. While the somewhat clunky interface could’ve been improved, it gets the job done and jumping into an online or ad-hoc game isn’t that difficult. The online deathmatches give Head On a healthy dose of replay value, and it needs it since the single player becomes bland and boring in a short amount of time.
Graphically, Twisted Metal doesn’t look half bad. The PSP’s widescreen allows you to see a lot of what’s going on, and the car models even have levels of damage modeling. It has a few impressive visual effects, but I’ve seen better texturing done on the handheld. After seeing the possibilities of the PSP’s graphical performance in games like Ridge Racer and Wipeout, it’s hard to be impressed by Twisted Metal’s visuals. Granted, 6 players in a wireless deathmatch means there’s a lot going on the screen at once and the game handles this very well with only occasional slowdown. This doesn’t stop the whole graphic feel of the game looking a little ’muddy,’ though. In fact, the whole game’s entire presentation feels a little muddy.
Control is where my main beef with this title is. I’m not sure if I’ve been spoiled by other car combat titles, or if the problem lies within the programming of Head On, but getting around in Head On proved to be a pain. The quick turn move is is very touchy, and performing it and ending up facing the direction I intended was difficult. Anyone who’s played even one car combat game knows that being able to pull off a perfect quick turn at critical moments is, while not completely necessary, crucial to coming out on top. In fact, overall I felt underwhelmed by the way the cars turned, moved, and overall controlled. It felt more like I was fighting people on miniature playsets with toy cars than actually ripping through Paris. Part of this could be blamed on the environments, I suppose; the sense of scale isn’t really there. Another reason could be the PSP’s screen; while it’s the largest on a handheld system, it’s still smaller than a TV, which is what I’ve played 3D car combat games on for years. Suddenly plopping it onto a little screen is disorienting, but something that could be corrected through visual design and tweaking the controls, which I can’t help by feel like Incog Entertainment didn’t spend enough time on. The outdated and unpolished controls may bother you less than I did, but they seriously hindered my enjoyment of Head On.
Sound effects and music are lacking. The music is very sub-par (I hate the game’s main menu theme) and is your standard fare of uninspired rock riffs on a loop. This is fine in gameplay as all the action going on tends to drown it out. Sound effects got a little more effort put into them, but the result is still lackluster. I’d like more than your standard *whiz* *pow* *boom* sound effects that are in so many games. I swear, developers share their sound effects libraries because I’ve heard same sound effects in about thirty different games. So often sound effects only get so much put into them to the point where it sounds "good enough" and the development team then moves onto something else. This seems to be the case here.
As far as length and depth go, Head On has some unlockable characters and levels, but I was left wanting more levels. Or rather, I was left wanting better levels. While the areas aren’t especially tiny, they aren’t too well-designed either. Jumping right into a new level can leave you confused when trying to find opponents because of the way many levels are laid out. This can’t be a good thing, especially when you have a radar to tell you where people are. Now, I’m not expecting to know a level inside and out the first few times I play in them, but I do expect to be able to get around intuitively and find ways to use the environment and position in them to my advantage, something that didn’t happen too often. Because of the way the arenas are designed, I ended up playing joust with a single character in open areas instead of chasing them all over, hunting them down waiting for opportune moments. I would’ve loved more diversity in weapons and what they do to enemies, as well. While the selection available to you isn’t too bad, I got sick of using all of them pretty quickly and was left wanting more.
Overall, nothing really impressed me about Head On. I had trouble keeping myself interested in it, and going through the different modes felt like a chore instead of fun. I’m reminded of a Penny Arcade comic where a game’s developers were discussing how getting around a level/environment really sucked, so they just came up with a way to get around faster instead of actually fixing the problem. I’m tempted to say Incog went down the same route with many of Head On’s problems. That may work now and then, but you can’t get around every design flaw by sidestepping around it; Head On doesn’t have enough frills to distract you from the issues it has, unless you’re easily entertained, in which case every ten seconds while playing the game your friends will hear you exclaim, "Oh golly wow! ANOTHER explosion!?" The comic also involved sex as a solution, but I’m not sure if Incog gets down like that.
I’m giving Head On a hard time not because it sucks, but because we’ve seen better from the developers working on the same series. If you’re a Twisted Metal fanatic, it’s hard to go wrong with this purchase as you’ll probably get over its flaws. I know people who can get over the flaws in Jedi Power Battles. I found the gameplay elements in Head On to get stale, even with the infrastructure gameplay in place. I can recommend picking up a used copy of this game, but I can also recommend about five other PSP releases to buy other than this one. It feels like a finished but untweaked and underpolished title that was pushed out the gate to have an online Twisted Metal game available at launch. Granted, it’s much better than most games pushed out the gate at a system’s launch. It’s not a terrible game, it’s just not great. Don’t be afraid to rent it and have a blast for a few days, but the slightly sloppy controlling prevents me from giving it strong recommendation, let alone keeping my copy. Consider this one as good as traded in.
| Graphics | Audio | Gameplay | Replay | Price | Final |
